An indictment prepared by an İzmir prosecutor seeks a jail sentence of between five and 10 years for prominent professor and social scientist İştar Gözaydın on terror charges.

Gözaydın was arrested on Dec. 27, 2016 due to her alleged links to the faith-based Gülen movement, which has been declared a terrorist organization by the Turkish government despite the lack of any evidence to this effect.

Gözaydın was a faculty member at İzmir Gediz University, which was shut down by government decree along with thousands of other educational institutions. A former Fulbright scholar, Gözaydın had worked as a research fellow at Birkbeck, University of London, and is also among the founders of the Helsinki Citizens Assembly, a Turkish-based human rights organization.

The indictment cites her job at Gediz University, her appearance on TV programs on the now-closed-down Samanyolu TV and Can Erzincan TV and her having a bank account at Gülen-affiliated Bank Asya as evidence of her membership to a terror organization.

Inspector Munisekar is now working in the central crime branch in the city police.

Lawyer K Nagarajan of Thiru Vi Ka Nagar filed a complaint against Munisekar for illegally detaining, abusing and attacking him inside the police station from 2am till 5am on September 20 last year.
The court admitted his complaint and issued notices summoning the inspector to appear before it. As he failed to comply with the court’s order for more than five times the magistrate issued an arrest warrant against him.

Nine lawyers in Minya started an open-ended strike against working in front of the province courts, after being handed surprising sentences from Minya Criminal Court on Monday.

The court, headed by Judge Ahmed Mawood, handed five-year prison sentences to seven lawyers and ordered the retrial of the other two lawyers, all on accusations of insulting judges and the judicial system as a whole. One of the two lawyers facing retrial was handed a life sentence and the other a three-year prison sentence.

The lawyers’ case dates back to 2013, when they clashed with a judge named Ahmed Fathi during a rally arranged in front of a certain court in Minya. The judge filed a lawsuit against the lawyers, accusing them of not respecting the judiciary system and preventing him from performing his work.

The defendants previously were handed life sentences. Due to the lawyers’ strike against their work in Minya courts, 120 cases were postponed.

Despite reconciliation with the insulted judge, the lawyer received the aforementioned court ruling. The Lawyers’ Syndicate will take all legal procedures to appeal the court sentences.

The prosecution originally referred 22 lawyers to court for insulting judicial panel members; however, thirteen lawyers were released, while the other nine continued to face prosecution.

A suicide bomber attacked a courthouse in the centre of the Syrian capital on Wednesday, killing at least 25 people and wounding others, state media reported.

“The preliminary toll in the terrorist suicide bombing at the old palace of justice building is 25 dead and a number of wounded,” state news agency SANA reported, citing a Damascus police source.

An AFP correspondent at the scene in the Hamidiyeh neighbourhood said security forces had cordoned off the area and roads leading to it were blocked as ambulances and firefighters rushed to the building.

The courthouse contains both an Islamic religious tribunal charged with personal matters, and a criminal court.

“We were terrified because the sound of the explosion was enormous,” a lawyer in the building during the attack told AFP.

“We took refuge in the library which is on a higher floor,” the lawyer added, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“It was a bloody scene.”

A local prosecutor told state television: “The terrorist targeted civilians… during a crowded period.

“The suicide bomber tried to enter and when police tried to prevent him, he rushed inside and blew himself up,” the prosecutor added.